Josephine Boyer believes everyone has a God-given talent to share with others. The gift she offers is her art. Boyer started Son-shine Art, a business that provides one-of-kind personalized creations last year. These creations include baby announcements, pictures of children’s rooms, greeting cards, and face-painting and black-and-white drawings for special occasions. The business got started because Boyer finally found the time to focus on her art. Moving six times in six years and caring for her son, Justino, kept her busy. However, after moving to Los Alamos last year with her son and husband, Brian, Boyer was able to focus on her art. Additionally, running her own business means she can work at her own pace and still be there for her family. Boyer explained she named the business Son-shine Art to recognize that Jesus is always present. Son-shine Art is just the tip of the iceberg of where Boyer’s art has taken her. It all began at age 5 when her father gave her a wooden easel. No one else in her family is an artist, although her mother was a seamstress, but “my father just knew I liked (art),” Boyer said. “He always encouraged me.” At 10 years old, Boyer took her first oil-painting class. She eventually gradated from the Central Academy of Commercial Art in Cincinnati. Immediately after graduation, Boyer worked at an advertising agency, creating newspaper ads, billboards and other items.She continued her career at the International Atomic Energy Agency, an organization of the United Nations in Vienna, Austria. She said she went for an adventure and ended up staying for 20 years.Boyer described her work with the IAEA an experience of a lifetime. She was given the freedom and inspiration to create everything from book covers to training materials for the scientific and political agency. In addition to her work with IAEA, Boyer indulged her art by taking watercolor classes in several countries such as Portugal, Greece and France. Through her work at IAEA, the Japanese government invited her to their country to design a presentation package for one of their major courses. Boyer describes her art as “therapeutic.” “You get lost in it and it doesn’t feel like work,” she said.Her travels have impacted her art. “I got to see in the less fortunate countries that they don’t have much but they still get to create,” she said. “They create what they have.” Boyer and her family were introduced to Los Alamos during a conference in Santa Fe in 2005. Her husband was a student working summers at Los Alamos National Laboratory and he wanted to visit his old residence. A year later, he was offered a job to work at the lab. Living in Los Alamos, she said, has been a positive experience. For instance, “the people are friendly, very interesting and extremely generous.”In addition to her business, Boyer is active in the local art community in other ways. She plans to participate in an arts and crafts fair Sunday at the Immaculate Heart of Mary Church and she is hosting an ornament painting party from noon-6 p.m. Dec. 8 at the Immaculate Heart of Mary Church. The event is a fundraiser for Work Youth Day and the cost is $25 for one child and $10 for each additional child in an immediate family. Besides her art, Boyer said in the past she has enjoyed roller skating and ballroom dancing. She said she hopes take up ballroom dancing again. Her other interests include walking and meeting with friends.